


A Game of Cards

by symbolcrash



Category: Harry Potter - Fandom
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-12-11
Updated: 2004-12-11
Packaged: 2017-11-14 05:33:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/511861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/symbolcrash/pseuds/symbolcrash
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Half a year after they leave Hogwarts, James, Sirius, Remus, Peter, and Lily are still getting together every week to play cards. Short, sweet, meaningful, and fully canon-friendly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Game of Cards

**Author's Note:**

  * For [harmonicalesson](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=harmonicalesson).



> None of it belongs to me. Duh. I've stolen JK's playthings -- that is to say, MWPP and Lily -- but only because she wouldn't give me her lunch money. They're all © JK Rowling, Bloomsbury Publishing, Scholastic, Warner Brothers, &c. Don't sue. I'll laugh, then wear your skin as a jacket.

The biting cold of December tore through the safety-net warmth of Remus Lupin's overcoat, desperate as he was to grab at the metal snap-buttons and frayed cloth where another wizard might have been grabbing the clasp of his cloak. He didn't mind cold weather, but the wind was certainly doing nothing to help that opinion. He covered his nose and mouth with a gloved hand, breathing into the concave heat-trap of his palm as he pulled the overcoat tighter around his angular form.   
  
He shivered. The sharp chill of the air wasn't altogether  _unpleasant_. However, he was faithful to a belief he'd possessed since the night he'd declared it triumphantly from a creative location atop the windowsill of the boys' dormitory ("That's what you get for drinking the eggnog in the red cup," Sirius had admonished, promptly handing Remus another of the same), and it firmly stated that one of the best reasons Remus had for loving the cold of the winter season was coming up with creative, comfortable ways to avoid it.  
  
Tonight, as it turned out, one of those ways had been preconstructed for him in the form of steaming hot chocolate (each mug appropriately doctored by Lily Potter, Mediwitch of the cacao, to suit the drinker's taste) and four different decks of playing cards, all of which waited patiently for players.  
  
Remus was patient as well, but with all respects, temperance and tolerance and patience were damned by default when it came to cards and Lily's hot chocolate.   
  
Squinting against the snowflakes which were determined to lodge themselves permanently in his eyelashes, Remus trudged along the cobblestone pathway to the Potter house, tapping the snow from his shoes on the bright red mat positioned by the door before he reached up to knock. His knuckles, however, met nothing but air. James had already opened the door.   
  
"Remus," he lamented, his manner somewhat maudlin, "I understand the need to be fashionably late, but you've kept us waiting for one-half of a bloody hour longer than you said you would."  
  
"Sorry." Remus stepped in, removing his overcoat and draping it on the wrought stand. "I had to take care of a few things before I left --"  
  
"Tell him he owes me half an hour of my wasted youth," cried Sirius adamantly.   
  
"Plus interest," added the unmistakable voice of Peter.  
  
Remus momentarily cast his gaze to the ceiling. James chuckled. "Come on, come on."  
  
They manoeuvered past the staircase and into the hall, James promptly turning to lead Remus into the kitchen and the small dining setup therein. Almost immediately, a blue mug was placed in his hands. Lily grinned broadly and gave him a peck on the cheek. "Thank you for coming, Remus."  
  
Remus blushed pleasantly and smiled. James threw an arm around his shoulders. "Now, Lupin, I won't have you wooing my wife. That won't do at all."  
  
Raising his eyebrows at James -- then at Lily -- Remus cracked a smirk. "Who was wooing whom?"  
  
James laughed, but his expression changed abruptly to one of confusion after a projectile-launched something hit him in the ear. He lifted his hand to the side of his head and turned toward the table. "What was -- Sirius, knave, put the peanuts down."  
  
Sirius sat at one end of the table, protectively cradling a half-full bowl of roasted peanuts. Peter snickered and stole one from it anyway. "No!" Sirius reprimanded him, swatting away his hand. "This has been declared ammunition until one Mr Moony, one Mr Prongs, and one Mrs Prongs should choose to take their seats at the table before we go mad with waiting."  
  
"A noble cause," Peter agreed, pretending to aim his peanut directly at Remus' forehead.  
  
Remus smiled at the two of them in exasperation and pulled out a chair. "Fine. Sitting, sitting." James and Lily also made their way to the table, Lily pausing to grab the cards from the counter before she sat down.  
  
"All right," Lily said. "The name of the game is Bryncir. Any objections?"  
  
Silence.  
  
"Good." She nodded and flicked her wand at the four decks of cards on the table, which leapt up and began shuffling themselves together into one massive deck.  
  
Remus watched the procession with some amusement. He didn't know why, but it had always been Lily's "thing" to make a show out of shuffling cards. She was modest in nearly everything else she did, but her card-shuffling demanded attention, and the four marauders were more than willing to oblige.  
  
After the cards hovered impressively over the kitchen table, they slid back together into a single deck and thirty-two cards were cut off the top of the deck for each person. The rest remained in the center.   
  
"You know," Peter started, rifling through his cards for pairs, "I've been thinking a lot lately."  
  
Sirius paused from his cards to look up. "Oh  _do_  go on."  
  
"Sod off, Sirius -- no, I've just been wondering about a few things. How -- how we're going about the wartime, and all --"  
  
"Agnngk," said James, covering his face with his hands in frustration. "I'm banning war talk from the card table from here on out unless You-Know-Who personally bursts through the door in the middle of a hand."  
  
Peter blanched, presumably at James' intolerance for the subject, and turned his attention back to his cards. "Sorry," he mumbled.  
  
Remus watched the exchange with his mug at his lips, waiting after it was over before he finally took a sip. His pairs were already laid out. "It's all right, Peter," he said. "But it  _is_  nice to get away from it. Once in a while."  
  
Nodding, Peter set down his (somewhat thin) deck after sorting through it. Sirius rolled his shoulders back and stretched. "So?" he said. "Let's talk about something cheery, shall we? Lily, James, that's your cue." He smirked and idly started to count his pairs. "How's the development on the new -- er -- development?"  
  
James beamed. Lily blushed, instinctively placing a hand on her lower abdomen. "Well, I couldn't tell you for sure," she replied, returning to her cards to double-check for those she may have missed. "It's been two months, and that's really all I can say."  
  
"Are you feeling any better?" Remus asked.  
  
"A lot better, thank you." Lily began to count her pairs.  
  
"She's stopped throwing things at me," James offered.  
  
Lily arched a brow. "Do you miss it? I could take it up again."  
  
"Er. That's all right, dear; I think I'll manage."  
  
Sirius chortled, making a noise under his breath that sounded something like "whhp- _pssh_ ," which caused James to give him a glare that would've sent the Dark Lord himself searching for a new pair of knickers. Lily smiled enigmatically.  
  
They each gave the number of pairs they possessed, and Lily dealt them a card for every pair while Remus wrote down the scores. The others re-checked their cards for new pairs after each card acquired. "How much are knaves worth?" Peter asked.  
  
"Fifteen," Sirius mumbled, laying out a pair of his own.  
  
After the points had been counted for that round, the rest of the deck was distributed evenly amongst the group. "Who gets first trick?" Lily inquired.  
  
"Remus," James responded automatically, furrowing his brow as he organised his cards.  
  
Remus shook his head. "No. I had mine last week. It's your turn." He had half a mind about what James was doing, if only out of an old habit, but for the umpteenth time in his life, he wouldn't allow it. "It goes you, Lily, Sirius, Peter, and then me." A smile. "Just for future reference."  
  
"Ah," James replied. "All right, then." And he played the first card.  
  
The rest of the game progressed rapidly, as their games always did; Lily took a break in-between tricks to refresh their hot chocolate and Sirius took a break when it became apparent that he'd had too  _much_  hot chocolate (a claim he fully denied upon his return as he requested another cup), but the game ended quickly all the same. No one doubted who'd won. Remus was uncannily good at card games -- a fact he knew despite his assurances to the others that it was merely "luck."   
  
"Good show, Remus." James congratulated him as soon as the scores were revealed.  
  
Remus gave a small smile. "Thank you."   
  
"Yes," Peter said quietly. He smiled as well. "Good show."  
  
Remus nodded modestly. The victory itself was somewhat hollow to him. It was just a game, after all; it was nothing more than the strategic choice of which card to lay down next. He'd learned earlier on in this particular game that the best strategy was to be sparse and cautious in picking out pairs, then holding onto the valuable cards for as long as possible while maintaining as much variety between suits as possible.   
  
He'd told Peter this when they were still playing in the Gryffindor common room, since Peter had approached him with a confession that he didn't get the point of the game if all he ever did was lose. Remus told Peter his strategy, and for a couple weeks afterward, the game of the latter boy seemed to improve. It wasn't long, however, before Peter had slipped back into his old habits.  
  
Peter never complained about losing again, though, so all Remus could do was smile fondly, shake his head, and dismiss the subject. Perhaps Peter had begun to treat winning and losing the games of the marauders (now the marauders-plus-one) like Remus did: without any thought. He was sure the others felt the same. The mindset of their group had never purposely depended on who came out on top -- the only thing that mattered was that they came out of it together.  
  
Peter helped Lily clear the table, and James leaned over to engage Sirius in a discussion about who replaced him as Gryffindor Quidditch captain. Remus glanced out the window at the snow, which was falling lighter than it had been earlier that night. He lifted his mug to his lips and finished the rest of his hot chocolate. It was technically tepid chocolate at the time, but it didn't take away from the taste at all; the coolness was nicely accented with the little bit of peppermint Lily had added just for him. Thinking about that made him smile, and he mused over how lucky James was -- and how lucky  _he_ was to still have friends like this, who constantly proved themselves to be nothing short of amazing.  
  
"Moony?" James said, waving his hand in front of Remus' face and interrupting his reverie. "You've a creepy-like smile on your face and we're afraid of what you're up to."  
  
Sirius gave a lopsided grin. "And why you aren't sharing the information with us."  
  
Remus laughed. "No, not up to anything." He reached into the bowl of peanuts, then popped one into his mouth with a light shrug. "Can't a man enjoy his victory?"


End file.
